Agenda item

Report of the City Treasurer and the Director of Policy, Performance and Communications

4.1       Steve Mair, City Treasurer, introduced the period 3 finance report which provided details of the forecast outturn in respect of revenue and capital and projected revenue and capital expenditure by Cabinet Member including key risks and opportunities.  The report also included details in relation to the revenue and capital expenditure for the housing revenue account.  Members reiterated their concerns about the significant variances between capital forecast and outturn against budget.  The Committee intends to consider  the Capital Programme, including the housing element, in more detail as a dedicated agenda item in 6 months as at this stage it was too early to monitor trends.  Noted that this is already part of the Committee’s Work Programme.

4.2       Mr Mair, in response to Councillor Boothroyd, advised that the Council produced an annual statement setting out how parking income had been used only on transport related matters and no longer produced a separate Parking Places Reserve Account.

4.3       Graeme Gordon, Programme Director, Evaluation and Performance Team, introduced the Quarter 1 performance report which presented detailed results of the period April to June 2017 against the 2017/18 Business Plans.  The report provided explanations and commentary in respect of outstanding, good and poor performance including achievements of targets and details of remedial action being taken where appropriate.  Mr Gordon, in response to Member questions, advised that a review of Key Performance Indicators would be undertaken with Executive Directors.  These would be more closely aligned to the City for All policy commitments or highlight if these were statutory. 

4.4       The Chairman referred to the recurrence of several similar under performing issues eg Pensions Admin associated with the BT contract.  He asked that a specific report be submitted to the next meeting on the replacement proposals for the BT contract.  It was noted that the proposed joint scrutiny meeting with RBKC had not taken place.

4.5       The Committee were advised that some Council officers had been diverted to respond to the Grenfell Tower fire.  Many of the families however remained too traumatised to be able to consider accepting the good offers of alternative accommodation at this stage.  The Committee were advised that officers were now returning from these duties and that a track of expenditure was being kept so these could be recouped from RBKC.  Costs up to £100k were being met locally by the authority providing the service.  Councillor Boothroyd stressed that the cost of replacing cladding should not be passed on to leaseholders.  It was noted that the HRA would need to be refigured as a result of this additional cost.  Generally, the importance of targeted communication was stressed.

4.6       The committee in particular asked questions regarding the transitional arrangements for Tri-Borough exit which is due to occur in March 2018.  It was noted that decisions were expected shortly with staff consultation due to commence by the end of September.

4.7       The committee noted that SEN would form part of the refreshment of KPIs.

            RESOLVED: That the reports be noted.

            ACTION:

1.           Report on the BT contract to be presented to the next meeting of the Committee (Action: John Quinn).

2.           The high profile risks to be highlighted in future reports (Action: Graeme Gordon).

3.           That a report on cyber security be presented to a future meeting (Action: Ben Goward).